When They're Sixty-Four: Peer Effects and the Timing of Retirement

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Brown, Kristine M.; Laschever, Ron A.
• 署名单位: University of Illinois System; University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign; University of Illinois System; University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN ECONOMIC JOURNAL-APPLIED ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1945-7782
• DOI: 10.1257/app.4.3.90
• 发表日期: 2012
• 页码: 90-115
• 关键词: social-security; incentives; decisions; pensions; work; plan

摘要

This paper examines the effect of peers on an individual's likelihood of retirement using an administrative dataset of all retirement-eligible Los Angeles teachers for the years 1998-2001. We use two large unexpected pension reforms that differentially impacted financial incentives within and across schools to construct an instrument for others' retirement decisions. Controlling for individual and school characteristics, we find that the retirement of an additional teacher in the previous year at the same school increases a teacher's own likelihood of retirement by 1.5-2 percentage points. We then explore some possible mechanisms through which this effect operates.